This Can't Be Happening
by BigLadyPotter
Summary: For James and Lauren, things have never been very easy, with constant arguments. Things only get worse when they wake up one morning and everything is turned upside down because somehow, they end up switching bodies. Now they have to find a way back to their own bodies while dealing with the awkwardness of switching bodies with someone of the opposite sex.
1. Chapter 1

**Hello everyone! Welcome to my new story! The idea for this came to me this morning based off of a dream I had where I was James. Of course my weird mind started thinking about it when I woke up, and thus this story was born.**

**Well I hope you enjoy it and let me know what you think :)**

I sigh as I hear the garage door being opened, signaling the guys are home. I stand up from the couch as I return to the person I'm on the phone with. "Well the idiots are home now. Thanks for telling me, Kelly."

"It's no problem. I'll talk to you tomorrow," she says before she hangs up.

I put my phone away and cross my arms as I wait for the guys to walk in. They pause as soon as they see me and I can see them getting worried.

"So would any of you like to explain why you almost gave Gustavo a stroke today?"

I stare them down, waiting for one of them to crack under the pressure. I've spent my whole life with these four and I know just how to make them confess.

"It was James's fault!" Carlos yells after a minute of uncomfortable silence and hides behind Kendall as James turns towards him, anger written all over his face.

"No it wasn't," James says defensively as he tries to hit Carlos but my brother stops him.

"Dude, calm down!" Logan says as he holds James back.

I walk closer to them and can see the panic in their eyes. I may be like a sister to them, but they know not to cross me. "Will someone please explain what happened?" I ask them again in a calm and collected voice.

Kendall visibly swallows before speaking up. "Well James was worrying about his hair, like always, when we were supposed to be learning a new dance. And I guess Gustavo just kind of blew up."

James crosses his arms and pouts like he doesn't want to admit that he was at fault here. I walk the short distance to him and smack him on the side of the head. "Idiot. You could have gotten Gustavo killed!"

"God Lauren, would you stop acting like our fucking mother?" James yells at me. "We're all 20 or 21 years old, so stop treating us like children!"

"We'll maybe you guys need to grow the fuck up!" I counter back at him before storming away towards the stairs and heading up them. It's always been like this with myself and James. We're always getting into arguments. It's been this way for years now.

I slam my door behind me and lock it, not wanting anyone to come in. I throw myself on the bed and scream into my pillow in frustration. When will that boy learn?

You would think they would be more considerate to Gustavo after almost four years of working with him and all that he's done for us. He bought us this mansion a year ago, but that guys always seem to forget about that.

We're lucky to be able to live in this house. A year ago Gustavo finally decided to move us out of the Palmwoods, and not to Bel-Air this time. I barely was able to stay since Mama Knight wanted to move back with Katie. Luckily my twin Logan knew I'd want to stay and convinced her. So here we are, me being the only responsible person in this house, left to take care of four men who still act like they're 16.

I hear someone pounding on my bedroom door and turn my head to the side so I can shout at them. "Go away!"

The person tries to turn the doorknob and finds it's locked. "Lauren, let me in!"

I sigh in annoyance at my brother but don't move to let him in. Yeah I was probably overreacting but I'm a girl. I'm allowed to have these moments every once in a while.

After a couple minutes he gives up and leaves, knowing I would have let him in by now if I wanted too. I lie there and pout for a while, still angry at James. He can be such an idiot at times and he's so freaking conceited and self-absorbed. And he seems to enjoy making me mad at him.

I don't know why we always get into fights. I get along well with the other guys; I mean, we have our fights every once in a while, but that's what happens when you've lived with the same people for the past four years now. But James just has this way of getting under my skin and pissing me off so bad. I swear he enjoys making me mad.

After I sulk for a while, I finally get up from my bed and walk over to the mini fridge in my room. I told the guys it's so I can keep all the healthy food I like that they have thrown away in the past, but really it's full of sweets that I don't want them eating. I grab a couple pudding cups and a plastic spoon from the box next to the fridge and head back to my bed. There's no way I'm going downstairs and having dinner with all of them.

I settle down, ready to mope around some more. I grab the remote from the dresser next to my bed and turn the TV on, flipping through the stations right away. Eventually I find The Notebook and stick with that, even though its already halfway through the movie. But I don't really care since I've watched it so many times before.

At one point Kendall knocks on my door and asks if I want to come down for dinner. I turn him down and he leaves without arguing with me, which I appreciate a lot. At least someone around here can act somewhat mature.

As I stay in bed and watch movies for the evening, I can't help but stay mad at James since he never came and apologized to me. But I should have expected it. He's always been a douche bag to me. I'll never understand it.

~BTR~

I wake up in the morning, fighting against the sun shining in to go back to sleep. There was no way I was getting out of bed yet and heading downstairs to face the guys. No way. They'll want to talk about what happened yesterday and I just don't want to deal with that at all.

I try falling back to sleep for a little while, but the sun is too bright. I cover up my eyes with my arm and I almost go back to sleep, but then my arm starts falling asleep. I sigh in frustration; why can't I get some more sleep? I was having such a good dream about Johnny Depp, too…

I groan in frustration as I roll over onto my stomach so I can hide my face in my pillow. I would have been able to go back to sleep if it wasn't for the fact that something on my bed in digging into my stomach.

I angrily turn over and sit up, whipping the covers off of me as I finally open my eyes and squint against the light, trying to find whatever is on my bed that is preventing me from getting back to sleep. But as I look down, I don't see the bed I fell asleep in with its pink blankets. I see the chic dark gray sheets of one of the guys' bed instead. I'm starting to panic as I realize its James's room.

I try to calm down as my breathing picks up, but I almost go into a full out panic attack when I look down at my body and see well defined abs where there should have been my chest. And then I notice the, the _thing_ sticking up in my shorts and I just lose it.

And I let out a scream in panic that does not belong to me.


	2. Chapter 2

**Hello! If you're here reading this, then that means that you hopefully liked the first chapter! I just want to clarify something. When I talk about James and his body, I'm talking about him in Lauren's body, unless I directly say something else. The same goes for Lauren, it's her in James's body. Does that make sense? I think it does. Oh well, just go read the story.**

I jump out of the bed and start pacing around the room, looking around at everything and trying to make sense of what the hell is going on. I mutter as I'm walking around. "This can't be happening. It's just a bad dream. I'll wake up and everything will be back to normal."

The door is thrown open and bangs against the wall and I my eyes widen and I scream as I see myself standing there. What should be my body screams as well as we stare at each other. I run over to the door and shut it, not wanting the other guys to come over here. I lean against it as I stare in shock at my body. "What the fuck is going on here?" I ask but instead of my voice, I sound like James.

"Do you think I know?! I fell asleep last night here in my room, and then I wake up and I suddenly have boobs and my dick is gone!"

I feel myself getting light headed at this whole think and I walk over to the bed and sit down, putting my head in my hands. I look back up at myself, "James?" I ask with uncertainty.

She, I mean me, well, _he_ gives me a look like I'm stupid. "Who did you expect, fucking Santa Claus?"

I raise an eyebrow at him. "Do you think I'm happy about this right now? I don't know how this fucking happened! I don't want to be a guy! And now I have this," I gesture to James dick, "to deal with! What am I supposed to do?"

James sighs as he walks over to me, and I swear it's the weirdest thing ever seeing myself walk towards me. "You just, you know," he makes a gesture and it takes me a second to realize what he means.

"Eww there is no way in hell I am doing that!"

"Well that's the only way you're going to get rid of it!" He states like it's the most obvious thing, which I guess it kind of is. "Fine I'll just do it," he says and starts reaching for it.

"No you won't," I say and push James away with ease and he falls on the floor. "I don't know what weird diseases you have from ratchet hoes. I don't want me touching it."

The door opens and both of us whip our heads over to see Logan standing there. He's frozen there in shock as he looks at us with his jaw dropped, and I suddenly realize why he's panicking inside. From where James in my body fell on the floor, it totally looks like I'm about to give James a blow job, except it's not really me. Wow this whole thing is so confusing.

Logan turns and starts running down the hallway while screaming. "Oh my god! My eyes, they burn!"

"Oh shit," I say as I chase after him. "Logan, come back! It's not what it looks like!"

I take the stairs down several at a time and find Logan in the kitchen with his hands on his face. "Logan, I swear that was not what it looked like."

My brother looks up at me and I swear he would kill me right now if he could. "Oh really? Because it looked like my sister was about to give my best friend a blow job."

I sigh as I realize it did look really bad. And knowing my brother, if I don't calm him down right now he's going to have a panic attack and pass out. I think quickly to come up with some lie to tell him so he doesn't have to know that I'm now in James's body. "Look, I fell out of bed this morning in my sleep and I panicked and screamed. Lauren came in to see what was wrong and then she tripped over her own feet. I promise you, nothing happened."

Logan is looking at me like he still doesn't believe me. "Dude, you know how much we argue all the time. Do you really think your sister would even want to kiss me, let alone give me a blow job?" I try not to be freaked out by how weird this sounds to me as I'm talking about myself but really saying that I'm James.

He doesn't say anything for a minute and I know he's working things through in his head. Finally he responds to me. "Alright I believe you man. I know my sister, and no offense, but she kind of despises you at times."

"None taken," I say because Logan is absolutely right; I do despise James sometimes.

"Now can you please go take care of your little problem? It's making me uncomfortable."

I then remember that James's body still has a boner- I refuse to think that it's really me that has one- and my eyes widen in panic. "Sorry dude!" I say as I take off towards the stairs, wanting to get as far away from the awkward situation I just had to deal with.

I get up the stairs and round the corner in the hallway to get back to James's room and I collide with myself and we fall to the ground. I stare down in surprise at my face and James looks up at me in disgust. "Will you get off of me? This is really awkward."

A door opens down the hallway and Carlos pops his head out. "Wow I did not know you guys liked each other."

"It's not what it looks like!" We both shout at him and he goes back into his room and closes the door.

I stand up and hold out a hand to help James up but he ignores me. He brushes himself off and glares at me. "God why do you have to be such a fucking klutz?"

"Why do you have to be so fucking annoying?" I reply to him and cross my arms over my chest, an action that feels weird now that I don't have boobs anymore.

"Just go deal with your little problem," he says and looks down. "Well never mind. Apparently an awkward moment with your brother and then colliding with your own body doesn't make you horny anymore."

I glance down and let out a sigh of relief when I notice I don't have a boner anymore. "Oh thank god, I did not want to have to deal with that."

"You will at some point," James points out and I glare at him.

"No, I won't, because we are going to the book store today and trying to figure out what the hell is wrong with us."

James starts backing away towards my room. "Or you can go and I'll stay here and tan by the pool. Did you know that you have a horrible tan line on your tits?"

I walk towards him and point a finger at him. "I swear to god, if you ever tan outside topless, I will make sure you can never have sex again."

He lets out a scream and it's kind of funny since it's now girly. "Yeah James, don't doubt me. Now go get dressed so we can get going."

James flips my hair over one shoulder and turns around angrily before stomping to my room while swaying his hips. "I don't walk like that!" I yell at him.

He flips me off over his shoulder before walking into my room and I turn to go into James's room. This is going to be a nightmare dealing with him.

I walk in and head over to the closet. When I open the doors, I'm overwhelmed by the sheer amount of clothes he owns. He might even have more clothes than me. I don't feel like dealing with this now so I just grab the first pair of jeans and t-shirt I can find. I head into the bathroom connected to his room to change and check sight of his abs in the mirror. I pause to stare at them. _Damn, that boy has a nice body._

I snap back to focus and start getting changed, trying to avoid looking at James's dick. It's not like I'm a prude and haven't seen one before, but it's a little awkward when it belongs to one of the guys you've known practically you're whole life.

After I'm dressed, I look at all of the hair products James has for a second before I just comb his hair and push it to the side. I think it looks kind of hot.

I hear a shriek from my left and look over to see James standing there. "What did you do to my hair?!"

I take a look at the outfit he picked out and my eyes widen. It barely covers anything! "What are you wearing?!"

"I look hot," he says with a hair flip.

"Yeah well so does your hair now," I say with a smirk.

He glares at me for a minute and I glare back. "I hate you," he finally says.

I push past him and walk as girly as I can, just to piss him off. "Oh you love me." I grab his keys and wallet from his dresser. "Now can we just get going please?"

"You're not driving my car," he says in the most emotionless voice I've ever heard from him.

"Hmm last time I checked, it's under the name James Diamond, oh and look who is James Diamond. Me." I smile smugly as I walk out of his room and hear him following me.

"You're such a bitch!" He shouts and I just raise my middle finger at him over my shoulder.

When I get down the stairs, I see Kendall sitting on the couch laughing. "What's so funny?"

"You two," he replies as James stops next to me. "You act like you hate each other so much but it's so obvious that you love each other."

"We don't love each other!" We both yell at him and he starts laughing even more.

"Whatever you say!" Kendall says while laughing.

I walk past him and slap him on the back of the head. "Shut up, Kendork. Tell Logan that we're heading to the store."

Kendall looks at me like I have two heads. "You're both going to the store? Together?"

"Yes, okay?" James says and I raise an eyebrow at him, hoping he'll act like I do. "I'm dragging James along with me so I don't have to carry any of the groceries."

I let out a sigh a relief that he didn't say anything to make Kendall suspicious and start walking towards the front door. "See ya, Kendall."

"Bye guys!" Kendall says over his shoulder as we walk outside. As soon as the door is closed, I turn towards James. "Thank you for not blowing that."

"Yeah well I don't want them knowing either," he says as he gets in the passenger seat to his car. "I'd prefer to not be put in a mental hospital."

"Wow for once we're actually thinking alike!" I say as I start the car. I put the top down right away, happy that James has a convertible. Before I start driving, I put on the pair of Ray Bans he left in here.

Feeling satisfied with how I look, I put the car into drive and take off down the driveway. I can see the fear on James's face before I turn onto the road; obviously he doesn't trust me driving his car.

I laugh as I'm driving, for once being able to enjoy having the top down without my hair blowing all over the place. When I get to a red light, I look over and see James fixing my hair that is all in front of his face. "Now do you understand why I get annoyed driving with the top down?"

"Yes," he says and presses the button to put it back up. I try swatting his hand away but I can't do much since the light has turned green and I have to drive.

"I'm pretty sure you're not supposed to do that while driving," I say to him annoyed.

"Whatever. Just get us to the store," he says and crosses his arms.

We don't say anything until we get there and get out of the car. I don't know what his problem is. I sigh and just walk in, hoping he'll stay behind me. I grab a cart and head towards the back where I know the meat is. I swear, those boys eat so much meat, it's almost disgusting. "Do you want steak tonight?" I ask him as I hold up a piece of meat.

His eyes light up for a second and I smile. Steak is his favorite food so it should cheer him up. "What kind of question is that? Of course I want steak tonight."

I nod and throw the food in the cart before moving on. The whole time we're in there, James keeps on putting junk food in the cart and I keep arguing with him about it. By the time we cash out and leave, we've definitely caused a scene.

As we get in the car again, I turn to him. "Okay let's just get to the book store and see if we can find anything that will help us figure out what the hell is going on with us."

"Please. I really don't want to be stuck in your body any longer," he says as he turns the radio on and blasts it.

I turn it down and look at him. "Why do you hate me so much?"

James just stares out the window, refusing to look at me. I sigh after a minute and put the car in drive so we can get going. The drive to the book store is filled with an awkward silence and I feel relieved when we finally get there.

I don't say anything to James and walk into the story with my hands in my pockets and look briefly at the sections before heading to the books on Ancient Culture Folklore. My gut just tells me that this is most likely where the answer is.

I start searching through the titles while James just stands there. "Well are you going to help or what?" I finally ask him. "You know, you're in this mess too."

He sighs like it's such a hassle for him to help and I resume searching. This goes on for almost five minutes and I'm just about to give up when one book catches my attention about Chinese folklore. I say as I pick it up and flip to the chapter list. I find a chapter that looks like it could help and start flipping to the page. "James, look at this," I say as James tries to look over my shoulder. I realize it's impossible for him to see as well since I'm much shorter and hold it to the side so he can read as well.

"_According to legends, during the Qin Dynasty in China, it was believed that your soul could be swapped with another's and the two would switch bodies. There was a belief that this would happen when two people could not see what another felt and to open their eyes to a new perspective…_" I read and look up at James.

"Well what the fuck is that supposed to mean?" He says abruptly and an older woman nearby looks up at him angrily.

"I don't know," I say simply before turning back to the book to read more from the passage. "_The key to switching back was rumored to be different for each pair, and many were stuck in the different body for the rest of their life._"

James and I both look at each other in shock over that. "Oh there is no way I am being stuck in your body for the rest of my life," I say to him and he nods his head in agreement. "We have to figure it out."

"What was that part about not seeing what another person felt?" James asks and points back to the book. "What's that supposed to me?"

I think about it and the only thing I can think of is what Kendall said to us before we left. _I think it means we have to fall in love._


	3. Chapter 3

**Hello everyone! I hope you have enjoyed the first two chapters of this story. I personally think this story is pretty interesting. Hopefully you do as well. And again, I just want to clarify something. When I talk about James and his body, I'm talking about him in Lauren's body, unless I directly say something else. The same goes for Lauren, it's her in James's body. Does that make sense? I think it does. Oh well, just go read the story.**

Not much is said in the car ride home, both of us just thinking about the fact that we could be stuck like this for the rest of our lives. I didn't voice my opinion on what the book meant by seeing how the other person felt. James would have flipped out on me and then we really wouldn't have made any progress.

As I turn into the driveway, I drive slower than normal, trying to put off seeing the guys. "So James? Are we just going to go on with normal lives and see what happens? At least until I can find more information on this."

"There's not much more we can do," James says from next to me as I park the car. He turns to look at me and again I'm a little freaked out by looking and talking to myself. James shrugs before getting out of the car and heading towards the house.

I get out as well and shout after him. "Aren't you going to help me carry stuff in?"

He turns and smirks at me. "No. That's why I brought you shopping with me so I didn't have to carry the bags."

"Asshole!" I shout after him as he just laughs while walking in the house. I grab the bags from the trunk before slamming it, not really caring since it isn't my car. I walk inside and Carlos rummaging through the fridge.

He looks up when he sees me carrying bags and starts smiling. "Good you have food! There's nothing to eat in this house."

"Yeah there is," I say as I set the bags on the counter and bat his hand away. He pouts as I start putting food away.

Logan walks in a sits on one of the chairs next to the counter. "So did Lauren say what we're having for dinner?"

"Steak," I reply as I start getting everything out that I need for dinner. There is no way I'm letting James try to cook.

"Don't worry, I'll grill it," Logan says confidently as he grabs the meat I just seasoned and takes it outside.

I look at Carlos and raise an eyebrow at him. "He's going to start the grill on fire, isn't he?"

"Yep."

"I'll go get the fire extinguisher ready," I jokingly say as James walks in the kitchen.

"I'm going to go swimming. Do you guys want to join me?" He asks and I scowl at how similar he sounds to how I am.

"Sure!" Carlos says before running towards the stairs to get changed.

James looks at me and smirks. "What about you James?"

"I would but someone's got to make sure we all eat tonight," I say to him unhappily. "Also, I got to make sure my brother doesn't start the grill on fire."

"Suit yourself," he says before turning to go to the pool and swinging my hips ridiculously. I swear I'm going to kill him soon.

I look out at the pool from the kitchen and I'm so glad the back wall is all glass. I glare out at him has I put corn dogs and tater tots in the oven. When James takes off the shirt he's wearing and reveals the tiny bathing suit he put on, I almost go outside and kill him. That little shit had to choose my bathing suit I normally only wear to parties.

Kendall's already by the pool and I can see his eyes widen at what should be me. Even Logan is staring in shock at what James chose to wear. I swear when I get back to my body, I'm going to punch James in the nuts so fucking bad.

I try to stay calm and just focus on getting dinner ready but then that fucker decides to put sunscreen on. It's 5 PM, there is absolutely no need for that right now.

I fling open the back door and walk out, heading to the chair next to James. He looks up as I approach and smiles innocently. "Oh James, can you help me put sunscreen on my back?"

"Sure," I answer venomously, but mostly because I don't want him getting on of the guys to help. He lies down and I start forcefully putting it on, making sure to cause him as much pain as possible.

"You son of a bitch," he mutters under his breath, not loud enough for the guys to hear, but definitely loud enough for me to hear.

"You do realize you just insulted yourself, right?" I ask and smirk before standing up and walking over to Logan at the grill. "How's it going? You haven't started any fires, right?"

"Please, I'm a barbeque master." Kendall laughs at this from in the pool and Logan glares over at him. "Just have everything ready to eat in five minutes."

I nod and head inside, washing the gross sunscreen off of my hands. I'm going to kill him. It's going to happen.

I take the food out of the oven and dump it on a plate before grabbing a beer from the fridge. Thank god James is 21 and can buy alcohol. I can tell already I'm going to need a lot of it to get me through this.

Logan comes inside with the steak, followed closely by Carlos. I can see James and Kendall walking in, and James is laughing at something Kendall must have said. I glare out at them.

"Dude, you totally like her," Carlos says as he observes my reaction. I look over at him and raise an eyebrow. "It's kind of obvious."

"Uh, no way Carlos."

"Even if he did, I would never let him date my baby sister," Logan says and I just want to hug him for being so protective over me, even though it's not really me in my body right now.

"Oh it smells so good in here!" Kendall says as him and James walk in and he goes right over to the table and starts grabbing food.

James starts to walk past and grabs the beer in my hand and takes a long drink before winking at me over his shoulder- well, technically my shoulder. The guys seem oblivious to this as they're all grabbing food and I sigh before sitting down at the table across from James. I take food but don't eat much of it. It's kind of hard to be hungry when you're stuck in a guy's body.

No one really notices except for James and I swear I see him look at my sympathetically at one point. The guys don't seem to be aware of anything, but I'm kind of glad for that. I really don't want them knowing about this craziness. My brother would probably make us part of some science experiment.

I don't notice my name being called until a hand is snapping in front of my face. "What?"

"Do you want to play video games with us?" Carlos asks expectantly.

I shake my head and I can see their disappointment. "Sorry guys, I'm not feeling that well so I'm just going to go relax in the hot tub."

I stand up and throw my plate in the garbage can before heading upstairs to change. I just pick a random pair of swim trunks from James's draw and throw it on. When I head back downstairs, everyone is gone from the table and I can hear the shouts from the living room that meant the guys were playing video games. I grab a new beer from the fridge since James stole my other one before heading outside. I slide into the hot tub and lean back, happy to just sit and relax.

I stare at nothing for a while as I just think about everything. How in the world did this even happen? And of all the guys I had to somehow switch bodies with, it had to be James. Of course it had to be the one I always argue with.

"Hey," I hear from behind me and I scowl before turning to look at James.

"What, did you come here to torment me some more? Because if that's the case you can just fuck off."

James doesn't reply but gets in the hot tub across from me. I glare at him before going back to drinking my beer.

He just looks at me for a while and it starts to creep me out before he finally talks. "Look, I'm sorry for acting like such an asshole earlier."

I raise an eyebrow at this but otherwise don't respond. I'm not going to ruin getting an apology from James since this never happens.

"I know you probably hate me, but we're going to need to get along if we're going to figure out how to get out of this mess."

I look over at him and know that he's right, even though I don't want to admit it. "You know, part of me really hates you right now."

James starts frowning as I continue. "But, you are right. We do need to work together to get out of this fucked up mess. Now can you please let me sulk in peace?"

"I won't say anything," he says and holds up his hands. He actually does what he says and the only sounds for a while are from the jets.

I enjoy sitting in silence and I try not to think about this situation and who knows how long we'll be stuck like this. Anything to keep me from getting upset.

"Do you wanna make out?" James asks suddenly and I spit my drink out. I look at him in shock, unable to believe he would suggest such a thing. He just shrugs. "Come on, don't tell me you're not a little curious about what it would be like to kiss yourself?"

"Um, no!"

"Oh… Well this is really awkward then."

"You think?" I ask him sarcastically. I shake my head and turn away from him. He is so unbelievable. Only James would suggest something so, so, so… ridiculous!

We sit in silence again for a while which I don't mind. I avoid looking at James until I hear movement and turn to see him next me now. "James, I'm not kissing you if that's what you came over here for."

"It's not," he replies right away. I shrug and look away from him. He sighs before responding. "Lauren, what happened to us?"

"I don't know," I whisper because honestly, I have no idea.

"Do you remember," he starts saying and I look over at him and he has this little smile. "Back in third grade when those fifth graders were picking on you because you wore your hair in pigtails every day?"

"And the one day you stood up to them and threatened to beat them up for me," I say and smile at him. "Yeah, I remember."

"Then in seventh grade you insisted on trying out for the hockey team with us instead of taking ballet like your mom wanted you too."

I laugh as I remember that time. "All of the guys were afraid to hurt me because I was a girl so I was able to score so many girls. That was a great year."

"And then we got to high school," he says a just drops off, knowing that that was when we started to become less close and no longer best friends.

"I hate high school for what it did to our friendship," I say and James nods in agreement. "We used to be so close and now we can't do anything without getting into an argument."

James doesn't respond to this at all and I'm almost ready to leave him before he speaks up. "I'm sorry. I really don't hate you."

"What?" is all I can say to him.

"I don't hate you. I know I act like a really asshole to you at times but it's kind of one of those things where I do it because I care. Do you get it?"

"…No."

"Oh. Well just know that I don't hate you. And I would really like to get back to what we used to be like."

"I'd like that a lot," I say and smile at him. I stand up and he looks at me confused. "Now I'm getting out of here because my fingers are totally getting all gross right now."

James laughs and stands up as well. "I'm getting out too then. I'm not staying out here by myself."

We both get out and grab a towel to dry off. After I do, I go up to James and hug him. He's hesitant at first but eventually returns the hug. It feels so weird hugging someone so much smaller than me. Normally I'm the one being held real close. "Thank you James. I'm really happy to know you don't hate me."

"You're welcome," he says before he chuckles. "I never really realized just how short you are compared to me."

"Shut up," I say and lightly push him away, being mindful that James is a lot strong than I am normally. I start walking towards the door and can hear him run a bit to keep up.

"So what are you going to go do now?" James asks as we walk inside and head towards the staircase.

"I'm going to read more of that book and do some research online to see if I can figure anything out to help us." I look over at him as we go up the stairs. "What about you?"

"Probably look through your room, find out your deepest and darkest secrets, eat the pudding in your fridge. Oh and look at myself in the mirror naked." I smack him so hard that he's knocked into the wall. "What the fuck was that for?"

"If you purposely look at my body in the mirror naked I will take naked pictures of you and 'accidentally' send them to a bunch of people."

He glares up at me and crosses his arms. "Fine then. I won't look in the mirror."

"Thank you." We pause in front of the doorway to my room. "I would really appreciate it if you would respect my body while we're swapped like this."

"Same to you," he says as he walks into my room and holds the door, getting ready to close it.

"I'll let you know if I figure anything out."

He nods before closing the door and I head to the room next to him. I walk in a shut the door before changing into different clothes. I then throw myself down onto the bed with the book and start reading, hoping I'll find anything to help us.

I spend almost two hours reading the entire book, and my hopes of getting things back to normal goes down with each page I turn. There ended up being only a small section on mind swapping and even then it gave no real clues as to how to get back to normal.

I throw the book across the room in frustration. I cannot spend the rest of my life in James's body. I like being a girl! I like dressing up and wearing make up and doing my hair. Oh and I like boys. I'm pretty sure James would not let himself be gay so that I can date someone. No way would he let that happen to his reputation.

I get up from James's bed as I just can't handle sitting still any longer. I'm on the verge of a panic attack when I decide to walk out of his room and back to my room. I knock lightly as I open the door and look in. "James?"

He sits up and looks at me and I swear his face almost lightens before he sees that I'm upset and he starts frowning. "Lauren, what's wrong?"

I just walk over to him and hug him as he pulls me close. "I couldn't find anything. I read the entire book and I couldn't find anything about getting us back."

I don't even know why I'm being so emotional but I can't help but start crying. James tries to comfort me and rubs my back soothingly. "Hey it'll be alright. We'll figure something out."

I pick my head up from his shoulder, but is actually my shoulder, and look up at him. "But what if we don't find anything?"

"Don't even think that, okay?" James sighs before leaning back and pulling me with him. He keeps his arms wrapped around me tightly and I curl up next to him. "We can work this out."

I nod as I lean against him and all I can think about is how backwards this is, with James stuck in _my_ body and having to comfort me in _his_ body. "Why did this happen to us?"

James just shrugs, moving me with him. "I'm not sure. Maybe we're meant to learn something."

"Maybe," I say to him, not knowing how much I can actually get out.

"Stay here with me tonight," James whispers and I know I have no mental will to say no to him.

"I will," I say quietly and start forgetting the fact that we've fought so much over the past few years, because right now, I just need my best friend back.


End file.
